Addressing Limitations of Claims Data

Claims data do not capture several aspects of women’s risk of unintended pregnancy: sexual experience, pregnancy intention, sterilization, or LARC insertion in a year preceding the measurement year, and infecundity for non-contraceptive reasons (unless the woman had a procedure during the measurement year). These limitations can be partially addressed by using data from the National Survey of Family Growth (NSFG) to help interpret the performance measure rates for provision of most and moderately effective methods of contraception.

How the Measure Should be Used

This measure is an intermediate outcome measure because it represents a decision that is made at the end of a clinical encounter about the type of contraceptive method a woman or teen will use, and because of the strong association between type of contraceptive method used and risk of unintended pregnancy.

No specific benchmark has been set for this measure, but the Office of Population Affairs (OPA) does not expect it to reach 100%, as some women will make informed decisions to choose methods in the lower tier of efficacy even when offered the full range of methods and all logistical or financial barriers to access are removed.

Measure specifications and SAS code have been developed to calculate the measures using administrative claims data: